Women's Issues, Peace, Creativity & Spirituality

The Danger of Reading the Newspapers

Caribbean sunset. Photo taken and copyrighted by Barbara Mattio.

I have been a news hound my entire life. I want to know what is happening. There are times when I am almost sickened. Yet I watch and try to understand why we humans commit the deeds that we do. I have friends who no longer watch the news or read the papers. I accept their right to make this choice. However, from my point of view, the deeds will happen anyway. But that is for each person to decide. I know that I have allowed pain into my heart that I could have escaped.

I have been unable to close my eyes to events, to chemical bombs, mass shootings, police shooting unarmed men. My soul prays and my heart hurts. I think if we turn away, we are giving into evil, to a dirty vile world.

So my remedy is to seek beauty. There is so much which surrounds us and we have but to look. Beauty is the antidote to evil and hatred. It might be a sunset, the fragrance of a flower, or a surprise email from a dear friend.

Courage is required to walk this journey through life. Some people are stronger than others. We can only do the best we can at the present moment. The gift of beauty does help us journey with bravery, strength, and dignity. I strongly depend on beauty. I surround myself with it and I metaphorically breathe it in.

I don’t say I don’t cry for victims because I do. But I hold on to my truth. I hold on to the memories which lift me up. I rejoice in the people who give me strength. Friends are such a rich resource in our lives and are worth more than gold.

It is Dangerous to Read Newspapers

While I was building neat
castles in the sandbox,
the hasty pits were
filling with bulldozed corpses.

and so I walked to the school
washed and combed, my feet
stepping on the cracks in the cement
detonated red bombs.

Now I am grownup
and literate, and I sit in my chair
as quietly as a fuse

and the jungles are flaming, the underbrush
is charged with soldiers,
the names on the difficult
maps go up in smoke

I am the cause, I am a stockpile of chemical
toys, my body
is a deadly gadget,
I reach out in love,my hands are guns,
my good intentions are completely lethal.

Even my
passive eyes transmute
everything I look at to the pocked
black and white of a war photo,
how
can I stop myself.”
——Margaret Atwood, feminist writer
Author of The Handmaid’s Tale

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7 thoughts on “The Danger of Reading the Newspapers”

Yes I do agree: we need to seek beauty and we need to spread good because if we do not do that on purpose and with special zeal and effort the news will gobble us up with terror and dark sensationalism. We need to know the news but we can certainly choose the sources we hear it from and when. I usually record the news and then play later fast forwarding parts that are what real news rather than story is.

Like you i find respite for all that ails our world in the beauty around me. I read of bombings, of shootings, of political decisions that serve only the wealthy and the burden of it seems almost unbearable. Then, I step outside and notice a daisy growing in a patch of weeds along a city sidewalk and my hope is renewed somehow.

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The Hands Up 4 Justice audio and video APP records encounters with law enforcement. This APP was created to video and audio record encounters with law enforcement for your safety. The best use of the APP once pulled over by the police, turn on the front facing camera and start recording..

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Hank Johnson Justice Fund

NO JUSTICE, NO MONEY
In the wake of the killings of unarmed black men and boys and the outrageous failure to prosecute their killers, Hank Johnson is introducing the Grand Jury Reform Act. This bill will prohibit the use of a grand jury when determining whether to prosecute a police officer in the event of a death. The status quo isn’t working. The evidence is clear. The people are demanding a real response from their elected leaders.

I am a retired widow with 4 kids and 9 grands. I worked as a nurse, and in Domestic Violence, and many non-profits, I was a donor health counselor for the American Red Cross and am a certified HIV counselor. I worked as a counselor and I have been a make-up artist and selling specialists for several American designers. I love life. I am very spiritual. I grew up in 50's and 60's and truly am the idealistic rebel which is the name of my blog. I love music, books, reading, Kindle, beauty. I am a photographer and an artist. I believe in making the world better one day at a time.

In Greek mythology, Cassandra was a cursed prophetess. She was gifted with prophecy but the curse ensured her predictions would never be believed. Not that it stopped her from speaking out. It behoves all of us to speak out about what is wrong but also about what is right. We can do that in our creativity whether it be prose, poetry or painting. What matters is the message.